NOAH Certification May Leave More Questions Than Answers

There is certainly no doubt that a governing body of building standards is needed in the tiny house industry. Since the modern tiny house movement began there has been a marked presence of DIYers that at first was endearing but later became an impediment. Because the mass of the movement was from a do-it-yourself perspective, there was an overwhelming concern by politicians and citizens alike. Even the RV industry took notice. Who was regulating these builds and what made them safe enough to be on the road or even parked next door to your house? A certification was needed; a certification that was attainable and relevant to the modern tiny house movement. Since the start of 2016 the National Organization of Alternative Housing (NOAH, for short) has been trying to do just that.

While there is no real ABOUT section on the organizations website there is a brief one offered on the Tiny House Community website. It can be paraphrased to communicate this:

Started by Floridians Andrew Bennett of Trekker Trailers and Robin Forrest Butler of Sherwood in the Forrest and Tiny House of Hope, NOAH was built from the ashes of an earlier set of standards assembled by the Tiny House Community and the Tiny House Alliance. Simultaneously, the Tiny House Foundation, started by Ryan Mitchell of The Tiny Life, but no longer active, undertook a similar effort over the course of two years but without publication success. The standards developed by the Tiny House Alliance were later modified and adopted by the American Tiny House Association. However, there were disagreements from two different groups (those who wanted no standards and those who wanted to follow the RVIA), and the certification program was changed to simple Guidelines.

This poses the first question. Why is the only historical information about NOAH being displayed on a website run by the person whose standards were mitigated in an effort to create new standards? Is there a connection?

Again, there is no doubt that without national standards, tiny houses are a large unknown to municipalities, zoning directors, insurance agencies, RV park owners, community planners, etc. But what NOAH seems to be lacking at this point is an actual authority. Both the RVIA and ANSI are existing bodies that, while not fully recognizing tiny houses on wheels, do have an ongoing dialogue about them and have standards that cover them. But the first red flag from NOAH comes in the form of a YouTube video wherein one of the founders of NOAH (and host of the video) proudly mentions “we’re not throwing this out for the government to control us…we’re self-regulating”. What does that mean? “We’re self-regulating.” If there is no one to monitor the standards and be accountable for them, then couldn’t anyone come up with a certification?

NOAH certification – by their own admission – is a standard. The definition of standard is “an idea or thing used as a measure, norm, or model in comparative evaluations”. Who then decides who on the NOAH team is qualified to become the measure, the norm? NOAH is neither recognized by government agencies nor insurance agencies and according to their website has no formal training or continued requirements for its inspectors. Wouldn’t a true standard be a sort of flexible in that it would adjust according to the state of the industry through time?

No real Director of NOAH

Not a governmental recognized certification board

Self-regulated

Video inspections

Just a low level investigation of the group seems to suspicious and that doesn’t even begin to cover the other issues brought up in one recent Facebook thread: proof of liability insurance, public records due to non-profit status, resolve of who is in charge, etc. This poses the second question:

Who is running this tiny Ponzi scheme?

It’s current membership boasts 15 professional builders and advocates in 18 states but has not been able to be recognized by anyone other than their own body. The key point of NOAH though is that it welcomes both professional builders and DIYers alike, holding their build up to a microscope for safety and integrity. The most recognized certification body in the tiny house world right now – The Recreational Vehicle Industry Association – does not acknowledge DIYers. There is a reason for this. RVIA is a historically and governmentally recognized national trade association that is comprised of people who collectively manufacture 98% of the RVs available today. They don’t recognize the backyard builder because there are too many unknowns in the build process to insure the integrity of the home. If you are building your own tiny house or living in a non-RVIA certified one then you are greatly limiting yourself in regards to financing, insurance, DMV registration and future parking options. It is completely ridiculous to compare what NOAH is representing to what RVIA does, at this point.

Says Bennett on his YouTube video NOAH Certified Tiny House Program, (:36 seconds), “…what it is is an inspection program for tiny house builders and even DIYers” so their home can be safe and certifiable. Again, that is the crux. Other than the NOAH inspectors themselves (whom are not named on the website or identified in any way) there is no one truly recognizing the NOAH certification. “NOAH inspects each Tiny House on Wheels at specific phases of construction for compliance to the NOAH Standard, utilizing a proprietary inspection system.” One has to ask what the proprietary inspection system is and how does it help the tiny houser in his pursuit of integrity, insurability, and longevity? In fact, the NOAH website identifies that:

NOAH Certification is not an unconditional approval of a Tiny House on Wheels builder, their product line(s) or particular model(s), manufacturing processes, business practices…

NOAH is not a government agency or agent.

NOAH Certification does not guarantee lending approval, insurance coverage or placement of Tiny Houses on Wheels.

So without truly defining their certification body the NOAH team discredits themselves and their actual certification ability. Yes, you can pay them money to be a member. Yes, they are a true non-profit (which is another topic altogether). Yes, they can look at your tiny house. But anyone can. That is the problem. Anyone can create a non-profit, build a website, ask people to join, and then say they are redefining an already accepted system.

The jury is out on this case. NOAH seems to have strong foundations and certainly its heart is in the right place. However, it is lacking true authority and at this time there seems to be no plan in place or rather no identifiable plan as to having the NOAH standards adopted by anyone other than bits of the tiny house community.

What do you think? Have you worked with NOAH in the past? Is your tiny home NOAH certified? Do you think it is a valuable resource for the tiny house community?

25 Comments

Thank you, Andrew Odom, for your role as a long-standing information source in the tiny house community. My hope with this reply is to provide a few details in defense of NOAH Certified and their tiny house inspection process.

Sadly, this article skims over information found on the NOAH website, but lacks the integrity of fact checking or a depth of research that presents an equitable case study and/or comparison of RVIA, PWA, NOAH, and the manufactured housing industry.

The Tiny House Movement is at its heart a bootstrap movement that each day overcomes the potential to die a quick death as a short-lived trend. It is amazing that little grace, and relatively no patience, is given to like-minded bootstrappers who would build an organization that selflessly stands up for DIY tiny housers and works to future-proof an ability for tiny housers to legally live full-time in an an RV park, a tiny house community, and (if dreams come true) private property as a secondary dwelling unit or primary residence.

RVIA’s stance on tiny houses is clear: Recreational vehicles are for temporary use ONLY, and NEVER intended to be used as full-time domiciles.

Like RVIA, PWA, and HUD, it seems that NOAH seeks to provide a means for DIY tiny house builders to build their homes as best possible using a prescriptive code base of recognized “code minimums” as the benchmark for tiny house approval.

My interviews with NOAH founders indicate that their inspection process uses the best of the NFPA 11192 (used for RVs), ANSI 119.5 (for park model RVs), and IRC (used by building officials for permanent dwellings). These codes do what others cannot: Provide hope beyond “recreational use only,” a term that mainly safeguards RV production from oversight by HUD, the government entity that oversees manufactured home production (which must be 400 sqft or greater).

Like HUD for manufactured homes, and unlike the typical home inspection process, RVIA only inspects the facility periodically, not individual units. They look for adherence to their own industry developed (and self-governed) standards. In speaking with RVIA’s Matt Wald, I was informed that RVIA had stopped admitting tiny house builders as Manufacturer Members as there weren’t enough units in development for their inspectors to see the entire lifecycle of the manufacturing process at a glance (i.e. 10+ side by side).

Sadly, while a builder’s tiny house may greatly “meet or exceed” the NFPA or ANSI standards, new up-start tiny house builders may remain unrecognized by the RV industry. As such, their units may remain unsealed by a 3rd party inspector which can prevent access to parking and insurance, not to mention bank financing. This is an unfortunate reality, and often a huge surprise, for new tiny house builders and buyers.

Rather than take a periodic peek at a production facility, NOAH inspection videos, records, and builder affidavits are kept in perpetuity for the day DIY and professional tiny house builders wish to have a specific tiny house placed in a community or private property. This is unique in the tiny house industry, and parallels the typical municipal building inspection process for site-built construction or placement of a dwelling on a chassis (i.e. industrialized building/manufactured home).

An inspector once informed me, “If I can’t see it, I can’t inspect it,” and NOAH’s records provide proof of an individual unit’s adherence to construction standards. Will this be enough for inspectors across the country to allow a tiny house as a full-time dwelling? Only time will tell, but I believe having NOAH certification as “alternative housing” has more potential than attempting to request a Certificate of Occupancy without any tangible records for the dwelling.

So while NOAH may not self-promote as well as others, or surreptitiously seek to discredit well-meaning individuals for their altruistic efforts, NOAH founders are on-track to help tiny house people “live tiny legally” with their certification program.

In the end, NOAH is a growing force that is gaining traction for all the right reasons. Before taking things at face value, I suggest tiny house builders and buyers find out for themselves how certification (NOAH or RVIA) can safeguard their tiny house from being considered an “outlaw shack” that requires destructive inspection when pitted against local Authorities Having Jurisdiction and law enforcement personnel who often view our tiny house interests as illegal camping or unapproved habitation of an illegally constructed structure.

Thank you again for your role as a tiny house information source. I hope to soon read a follow-up article that includes an accurate recount of NOAH services and the potential it offers those seeking to live tiny legally. Looking to the future.

You are certainly welcome for our continued role in the tiny house community and I thank you for yours.

Let it first be noted that I try to write with an even hand and that it was never my intention to do all of the research and draw a final conclusion about NOAH. Rather it was to point out what struck me and challenge people to find out for themselves. That said, my tone probably became more accusatory as I went through the site because I kept coming back to unanswered points, lack of clear communication, and a misunderstanding of who is who with NOAH. For instance, what is your role with NOAH? Do you have one? Where has the money already paid for NOAH membership gone? Who actually runs NOAH and what are their qualifications? Who are the current NOAH inspectors? Is there any sort of checklist a builder can access for an example of what will be inspected? How is a video inspection anywhere near thorough enough for a valid certification? Does NOAH carry liability insurance? How does NOAH protect its members should a certified house cause an accident? The questions are far more present than the answers.

I also want to be clear that my role was not to do a point-by-point comparison of all the certifications possible (NOAH -vs- RVIA). That is not my role as a blogger. I do not run a corporate website and have no skin in the game. My role is simply to write about what I see that impacts my day-to-day. That said, the conversations around NOAH within the last 6 months have been from folks truly looking for something that gives them a sense of safety, a finance option, and an easier ability to become insured. Far too often though those pleas have been met with the sound of crickets. That just doesn’t sit well with me.

You state that “The Tiny House Movement is at its heart a bootstrap movement that each day overcomes the potential to die a quick death as a short-lived trend” I beg to differ. The MODERN tiny house movement as defined by Jay Shafer’s initial appearance on the Oprah Winfrey show is a bootstrap movement, perhaps. But the notion for people to live in homes that are safe and legal, is nothing new at all. I could go all the way back to my first post on Tiny House History 101 that was originally posted on the Tiny House Blog, but I digress. I am just saying that the only thing new in question is the organization that is “selflessly” created to provide a “future-proof an ability for tiny housers to legally live full-time in an an RV park, a tiny house community, and (if dreams come true) private property as a secondary dwelling unit or primary residence.” I assume you are referring to NOAH and if you are, I ask you to please point out where there is any proof that much has been done other than the collection of membership payments and empty promises. That is all I am asking. Would a representative of NOAH please stand up and let everyone know what is going on and how NOAH is going to bring a legal and documented certification to market?

Thom, you note that NOAH seeks to “provide a means for DIY tiny house builders to build their homes as best possible using a prescriptive code base of recognized “code minimums” as the benchmark for tiny house approval.” Is that what we are striving for? Best possible? Is that good enough? Does that allow insurance agencies to feel secure in insuring a home? Is that enough for a lending institution to approve a housing loan? Are you saying that I should plant roses around NOAH’s offices because they are trying to build a code base around code MINIMUMS? Is that what we want? To we want to be the second-best stepchild of the housing industry? If it were your health at stake here would you want to go to a doctor whose certification comes from an amalgam of “code minimums” or would you want the absolute best practitioner that balances education, experience, legality, and assurance/insurance? I would think so.

You also state, “My interviews with NOAH founders indicate that their inspection process uses the best of the NFPA 11192 (used for RVs), ANSI 119.5 (for park model RVs), and IRC (used by building officials for permanent dwellings).” Who were those founders? Why have they not come out publicly in forums and on their own site to discuss the process? You also used the word indicate. Call me a logophile but I call that in itself to question. Indicate means suggest as a desirable or necessary course of action. So now we are hedging our bets on an organization that suggests a course of action? Why not use the word “prove”? Perhaps because there is no proof to date? And again, why the “best of”? Who determines the “best of”? Is there a Cliffs Notes version of NFPA, ANSI, and RVIA, that I can pick up somewhere? If so, I’ll start my own certification program and charge half of what NOAH is.

Last point before this argument gets too petty. In your bullet points you highlight NOAH uses industry leading, licensed 3rd party inspectors. Who are these 3rd party inspectors? What are their credentials? Why are they not listed on the site so one can do their due diligence on the inspectors and their credentials? Why the veil? If NOAH founders are on-track to help tiny house people “live tiny legally” with their certification program, then where is the proof? I invite the first person with a NOAH inspected house to fill us all in on the whole process and let us know how it has benefited them in their pursuit to live legally.

It goes back to legislation first; local legislation at that. My wife and I lived legally for almost three years in our tiny house. We had no certification from NOAH or even RVIA. What we did have was an open line of dialogue with our local zoning administrators, our local politicians, our neighbors, etc. This type of self-appointed certification (I just cannot come to call it altruistic in any means) should not be relied on by anyone at this point. There is work to be done for “outlaw shacks” but it can’t be done by outlaw builders and gunsmoke inspectors. That simply isn’t the world we live in.

Thom, my response is not to call you to task or to look down on you. That is not who I am. I appreciate your thoughts. I will not however be writing a follow-up article until there is something worth following up on. I do, however, open the floor for those NOAH founders, to remove the veil, turn the lights on, and educate us all. I, too, am looking to the future. It just may not be in that direction.

Regarding my role, I design custom tiny houses for people, and started our business in Virginia. The Commonwealth is notably a conservative state, and one in which a single house on a single property is plenty. Minimum square footage is usually 900 sqft or more which is — by their standards — generally small enough. For those of us who love the tiny house concept, 900 sqft is much bigger than we need, so why force us into something so large? My role as an unpaid advocate started there and continues to this day.

Working with local code officials as the ATHA State Chapter Leader, I saw the downside of the televised dream that tiny houses can be put most anywhere. Working with code officials in our area, and those at the state level, we proposed code change to our Uniform Statewide Building Code, which is almost wholly IRC based. These same folks attend the international meetings, so I had good input on how to best proceed with proposing code change for tiny houses.

Sadly, these same folks took an opposing view against tiny houses. The representatives included municipal Building Officials, Fire Marshals, and members of the special interest groups including the state’s Manufactured Housing Institute (MHI), American Institute of Architects (AIA), and National Homebuilder’s Association (NHBA). The short answer was, “You can build a ‘tiny house’ using existing codes,” so there was no need to introduce tiny house specific changes. Government working with special interest groups means the deck is stacked against us.

So, NOAH aside, I advocate for tiny house folks to 1) solve your parking first, and 2) to build a tiny house to a certification standard, whether NFPA, ANSI, IRC, or (most recently) NOAH. Though I’ve heard many tiny house builders say “I build by the certification standard,” this isn’t really the same as having an inspected and certified unit. Building inspectors won’t inspect a structure on a chassis as that isn’t within their purview. RVs are only for temporary use; mobile home manufacturers are state certified and allowed to issue a registered seal. Again, this leaves tiny house companies, and DIY builders out in the cold.

Tiny houses are generally built more like houses, and less like RVs or MHs. As such, it is my belief that tiny houses can be used as permanent dwellings, so long as government entities move beyond the paradigm that existing special interest groups (RVIA, AIA, and NHBA) currently account for all possible types of dwellings. When it comes to building tiny houses, we are breaking new ground.

Your questions are good, though I cannot answer on NOAH’s behalf. Regarding my role with NOAH, there is nothing official for us at this time. Regardless of any opportunities to work more fully with NOAH, I wholeheartedly plan to remain in an advocacy role for living tiny legally. Truth be told, your allowance to live in your tiny house with the blessings of local administrators is unique, and I am simply working to find a way to extend that privilege — or should we say right — to others who choose to live in tiny houses.

I would like to answer each question, and am glad to do so as time allows, but typing is slow and impersonal. You are welcome to contact me directly, and I will be glad to discuss any and all of this openly and honestly. I have no hidden agenda or ulterior motives, and welcome a 1-on-1 discussion via phone or Skype, or live-streamed conversation if you prefer to keep all the cool tiny house dialog public and available for response.

As it is, the day comes to a close, and its time to leave my unpaid advocacy role behind and put on work clothes to feed our family.

Thank you Andrew Odom for writing this article. As Richard Nixon said during Watergate, “Follow the money” then had to tell the world he was no crook.

The whole NOAH, ATHA, Trekker Trailers, Jacksonville State College engineering school, and certain builders from the southeast region of our country are behind and driving this thing.

It’s the worthless fees, subscriptions, requests for donations, and possible hush money that could be paid between TH builders and the unknown inspectors that worries me.

You are correct, there are no names of officers on the NOAH WEBSITE making it not transparent yet the people in the videos keep saying they are. The group is not ethical until they post the names of the individuals, non for profits have to post public documents to state officials and the names of the officers have to be submitted, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid would even say “Who are those guys”. It appears the founders and / or collaborators in the NOAH group don’t want to be sued or charged by state officials. Why? There is money involved.

1. The insurance issue- By each individual state law, only a licensed agent in your state can provide you with insurance. An insurance company in one state has to be licensed in your state in order to be covered. Why? The States Attorney in your state needs to know who to contact if claims and perceived fraud is taking place. They need to investigate claims. State officials would look at the NOAH website and say “What is this crap, no names of officials, no trail to follow”. You nailed this point.

2. Individuals with businesses building TH’s setting standards and charging certification fees through another created non for profit entity. A total no! no! It’s like asking the NFPA to burn houses to keep the need for the association going so they can collect more fees and memberships. Follow the money, you are correct, who’s getting it, keeping it, and influencing others to pay it. Mixing for profit and non profit entities by founding members is highly questionable. Builders could easily pay additional money, some people call it hush money to get the inspectors to approve their builds. This is bad for the TH movement, and will be bad for those who get caught.

3. Asking for non for profit donations to supposedly build free housing when the non for profit will give give the proceeds to the connected for profit builder to build it. The IRS would have fun with this one. No need to figure this one out. It is wrong totally. Follow the money.

4. If NOAH had the heart it would seek funding from institutions that investigate who they would give their foundations money too. They would have to be transparent, ask foundations for funding, establish a board, and be held accountable by the foundation, state officials, and the IRS. They choose instead to ask an uninformed public for money, quietly with no names or face on the NOAH website.

The ethical way would be to seeking funding from foundations who would screen them, then everyone could see if they really want to do good deeds or just play with an individuals hard earned money as they seem to be doing.

The certification fees for what the website says “What NOAH is NOT” is the red flag that it isn’t what it should be , they admit that yet they want to charge huge fees for a questionable process. What an insult they are making to the public who participates. It’s like they are challenging you to be stupid enough to pay the fee and participate. What arrogance.

As with Nixon, arrogance and greed is the seed of all stupidity. Your research I believe has found plenty.

Great dialogue to still unanswered questions.
At its present state, NOAH charges all sides of the equation with no government backing or insurance or recognition. To call it a certification is at its core…misleading at best.

Self-Regulated in and of itself isn’t necessarily a bad thing. There are a couple industries that are self regulating. One industry that comes to mind is the ACCT (Association for Challenge Cource Technology), AEE (Association for Experiential Education), and AMGA (American Mountain Guide Association) all working together for challenge courses, climbing equipment, and team building industries because all three overlap in skill sets and equipment, they work together. They are not a government agency, but organizations that work together to ensure the safety of those industries. They are a self-certifying body.

The difference is that they collectively represent the best possible practices of that industry. As such, they are recognized as a requirementby insurance companies within those industries.

One problem that I see within the Tiny House community is instead of getting the best collective efforts together, working together, we are fractured into several different groups. I would like to see us all get on the same page. Some of this is just due to some personality conflicts. Personally, I would rather see certification of tiny houses be self-regulated. We have more say that way. We have more options for the DIYers that way.

This is neither an endorsement of nor a critique of NOAH, but I am also a part of ATHA which at one point was trying to write ANSI specific codes for THOWs, Andrew Morrison is also working on a similar project with IRC, and multiple builders are trying to work with RVIA. While it is good to explore different avenues, we need to come together to better represent strength in numbers.

Thank you Thom and Andrew for your comments and your work in the tiny community we are all trying to help grow.

One of the main problems that the Tiny Industry (TI) is facing is insurance (the other being money lending). As many of you know we have developed and implemented the only tiny home insurance product in the marketplace. This product covers tiny homes as homes (NOT RVs) and provides a trip endorsement to allow the home to move. There are many other nuances and aspects to the insurance policy that we spent 9 months crafting with an insurance company. One of the main requirements from multiple insurance companies is that a Tiny Home Builder build the home.

I spent time at the Jamboree discussing NOAH and several other inspection programs with proponents and tiny home industry experts. I also spent time trying to figure out the NOAH certification (and any other certification program) and see if I could incorporate it into our insurance program and allow the main program to handle the DIY industry. I want this to happen but it is complicated and complex and the issues are not understood by most outside of my boring little industry.

I then spent time trying to research the different programs to see if I could build out a proposal to get DIY covered. With this in mind I scheduled a call with NOAH (and was stood up). I did web searches and research on key people. I could find nothing about the founders or inspectors of NOAH. To make sure my standard was not too high I did a search on LinkedIn for Thom, Darin, Andrew, myself and most of the people blogging or in these threads.. All show up with references, links to publications, web sites, history etc….

A search of the address listed on the NOAH site directs me to the UPS store in Apopka, Florida, and a Google search of the organization does not bring up any of the leaders, inspectors or managers of the organization.

That being said I am more concerned more about the insurance side of this debate…. so let me speak simply..

A home is built by a licensed contractor (usually), and different aspects are worked on by licensed professionals (electrical, plumbing, heating etc..). These professionals are insured and have years of experience in their fields. Despite this there are claims… roofs leak, electrical wiring catches on fire, HVAC systems output carbon monoxide, sewers back up… In all these cases the homeowner and/or neighbors have the ability to litigate against someone and that someone has insurance (hopefully). So when the electrical wiring catches on fire and your home burns down your homeowner policy and the electrician’s insurance policy stand up to provide you recourse to repair your damages.

With a tiny home on wheels the damage that can happen is catastrophic especially if the problem occurs on the highway. If the home is not bolted to the trailer frame (and instead used screws) then the homebuilder and any inspection/certification company will be sued. This is where the insurance for the home inspector company comes into play. Professional Liability insurance protects the professional in case they make mistakes. Typically the inspector has physically seen the site/build and rendered a professional judgment that the home meets some code. This requires (any sane person would expect this) a certification from a professional body for the inspector, training, guidelines, experience, licensing and also insurance in case there is an error.

I would expect any organization that has the professional expertise to inspect tiny homes and certify them to have a series of training programs – I Googled ‘Home Inspector training’ and found dozen of sites and classes with schools. One example is the PHII (professional Home Inspector Institute). The course to become an inspector is $595.00 and takes 2-3 weeks. There is then a state certification program at which point your will have to procure insurance (about 3-5k a year per inspector). Continuing education courses are required and each inspector must get re-licensed every few years (depending on the state). All this is done for the express purpose of having a uniform standard that protects the home owner.

Sadly I don’t see any of these requirements for Tiny Home inspectors. Google does not show a school for becoming a Tiny Home Inspector, There is no published guidelines on what is expected. I would think the next logical step is to take home inspectors and make them tiny certified, but there is no program for this. I also searched for ‘Tiny Home Inspector Insurance’. Again multiple web sites referencing several professional organizations.. and applications that ask about mold inspection, meth inspection, radon inspection, termite inspection, Lead paint inspection…. Just one thing missing – NO TINY HOME INSPECTION…

Martin I’m sorry you were “stood up” I have never personally not returned a phone call. I assure you that you were not stood up. We were signed up to be at the Jamboree with high hopes of publicizing as much info as we could about our service. After securing our travel and lodging we were sent an email banning us from participating. We are only 4 people founding this organization and working our other businesses to support it and our families at the same time. I most sincerely appreciate you efforts in insuring tiny houses as permanent dwellings as well as travel. We have had this coverage with Progressive for about a year now but it is at a high premium. I’m sure you have made progress that surpasses this. We have not spent much time defending ourselves on social media because we are simply too busy trying to solve the business challenges of making sure NOAH is solid as sustainable. There is far too great a work to be done here to dedictate the time it would take to fight the nay sayers. We are making progress and we will accomplish our goals for this movement. Here is my personal cell phone number 352 409 4005. Let it never be said again that you were stood up for a phone call. I look forward to chatting and working together for the greater good.

I’ll give you a shout tomorrow. I am happy that you are working to help the industry and assist the movement in moving forward but (as my earlier comment showed) am really worried that you are placing yourselves, the industry and the tiny home owner, in a precarious position. I tend to look at worse case scenarios. In this particular case I think about a tiny self destructing on the highway causing a lot of fatalities.

Here is how it plays out in our litigious society. Lawyers circle like vultures, just waiting for the right moment to swoop down on the tiny home owner, the auto insurance company, the NOAH certification company, the professional who certified it (professional certification bypasses the protection of a LLC – think, your doctor cuts the wrong leg off – he cannot declare his LLC bankrupt because he is perceived as a professional), the non-profit who is certifying people and, I would guess, the board of the non-profit. Let the feasting begin….

1) The tiny home owner will declare bankruptcy (its a multi million dollar claim).
2) The builder does not exist because it is a DIY. Subsequently there is no protection there.
3) The car insurance will pay out at whatever limits the driver has and probably will sue the remaining parties for the difference.
4) The professional who certified the work will get sued. I assume they have E&O insurance.
5) NOAH will get sued since they are responsible for the certification that was not done correctly
—> NOAH most likely declares bankruptcy as a non-profit and hands it over to their insurance company who will either a) cover it because it was written as a certifying entity or b) decline to provide coverage because you either c) don’t have insurance or d) have the wrong insurance
6) An attorney would sue the board of NOAH (the non-profit entity) since NOAH developed a program.

I really applaud the fact that you are building a certification program but my concern is that in a worst case scenario there will be a lot of negative repercussions. Our country is litigious and you might want to discuss insurance coverages with a Florida agent. At the least you need General Liability, professional liability (for inspectors), and an umbrella over those two.

You might want to consider a product recall program. What happens if your certification misses something and there are 50 NOAH certified tiny homes with this problem? If you are a non-profit you need D&O insurance and I could list a bunch of different things which a start-up really doesn’t want to hear.

The repercussions extend beyond you Andrew. What happens if someone buys a shell from a large builder, the DIY does the electrical (following the manual) and the tiny burns down, killing someone? All the above law suits will happen and the tiny home builder will also be drug into the case because they built the shell.

Again I am happy to call you but we’re in different spaces here. You are working on a certification program and I am working on insuring tiny homes. I can use a certification program to insure DIY but I need to make sure the certification program meets our very stringent guidelines.

Thanks Martin. We certainly have considered all of these angles ourselves before setting out on this uphill climb. Our standards the same ones already accepted by municipalities in building and highway travel. We simply document them. If you have a better set we are open to them. The safety issue is one of the biggest reasons we started this program. We did start out as a non profit but have since realized that it would limit us in some ways. I would think that as an insurance expert that you would appreciate documentation of the product being insured. I know that even as a buyer this info would hold great value. It seems simple to me that we offer something that would better serve the community if we worked together. You want to insure and we want to offer documented proof of what you are insuring. I would suspect your underwriters would appreciate it.

Hi guys. I wanted to chime in to say that just a few minutes ago I got off the phone with an insurance broker (not Martin…though I did speak with him as well today 🙂 and he shared in our interview that he is frustrated by NOAH and PacWest bc he receives calls regularly from tiny house DIYer want-to-be’s frustrated that they can’t get insurance unless they pay the dues for PacWest and NOAH’s certification. This broker then tells them, to their surprise, that they CAN get insurance as a DIY build. This information was offered to me without me mentioning anything about either organization at any point. The question I would like to ask NOAH representatives is, why are you making claims that people need to receive your certification in order to receive insurance? It’s one thing if one person perhaps misunderstood what PacWest and NOAH claim, but to have several people voice the same concern raises a red flag for me. I welcome any follow up information on the matter.

Agreed, Gabriella. Hopefully the all the “you can’t unless” lingo and errant expectations are removed from the equation. It seems as if great news and (sadly) misinformation move through the tiny house industry faster than rumors in a high school. Hopefully suspicious info, errant data, and all the “you can’t unless” absolutes are replaced with honest answers, solid options, and affordable costs. Ah, it’s great time to see our tiny dreams become real world solutions. Live Large — Go Tiny!

First off, thanks to all who have replied to this post. Your input is appreciated, and your requests for information have been heard. Hopefully we will provide you with answers to your questions, and invite to make additional requests for information about NOAH’s Certification Program for Tiny Houses.

We will try to be brief here. Answers to questions and concerns, lots of in-depth information, and details on the solutions we offer tiny house manufacturers and DIY builders can be found at: NOAHcertified.org. Again, your questions and requests are welcome and appreciated.

First off: What’s the need? For many, the interest to call a tiny house a full-time dwelling tops the list. For others, securing lending for construction and affordable insurance are paramount. It is our purpose and mission that owners of a NOAH Certified Tiny House achieve these goals.

The NOAH Standard – As for traditional houses, most tiny housers can appreciate that lending agencies, insurance providers, and building officials often require assurance that specific standards are met during home construction. The NOAH Standard uses common forms of “prescriptive code” for the building of a tiny house, and simply references the most commonly accepted codes for RVs (NFPA), Park Model RVs (ANSI), and site-built homes (IRC and NEC among others). These code bodies periodically modify their standards, so the NOAH Standard will change accordingly. We would, of course, love to see Tiny Houses added to the IRC.

NOAH Inspection – NOAH uses professional 3rd party inspectors (InterNACHI among others) that follow our 5-stage inspection process. Manufacturers, building professionals, and DIY builders all adhere to the same quality standards through our proprietary system. Since many tiny houses are built outside of the locality in which they will be used for permanent full-time or part-time residential living, our virtual inspections provide a detailed record of the construction of each tiny house.

NOAH Tiny House Certification – Upon completion of the inspection process, with proof of adherence to the NOAH Standard of recognized construction codes, a tiny house receives a Certification Seal. Records of each tiny house’s build are readily available for review by homeowners, lenders, insurance agencies, and local building officials.

Tiny House Lending – Securing a loan for tiny house RVs is easier today thanks to certification of “turnkey” tiny houses as NFPA and ANSI compliant recreational vehicles. A “turnkey” tiny house RV is a unit wholly produced by a tiny house manufacturer that is recognized by the RVIA or an equivalent 3rd party certification company. While RV loans are readily available (most requiring a brick-and-mortar home as collateral), our goal is to assist tiny house manufacturers, tiny house shell finishers, and DIY home owner/builders with more affordable and more readily available lending options for use as houses, not just vehicles for recreational purposes.

Tiny House Insurance – Insurance has been available for tiny houses for years, though the availability of affordable options has been absent. We are glad to hear that Martin is focused on tiny house specific insurance, and we are also working with other major insurance companies on offerings that provide NOAH Certified tiny house homeowners with readily available and affordable options.

We believe in truth and transparency, and invite you to find answers to your questions directly by visiting NOAHcertified.org, emailing our staff at Info@NOAHcertified.org, or simply calling is at 508-603-6624. One of our company’s representatives will gladly reply to your requests and provide answers to your questions in a timely fashion.

Awesome response and good information. All I’ve asked for is a sample inspection and copies of your insurance as a certification authority along with your inspectors. Since you now are using InterNACHI they are all required to have insurance. Can you give me the name of some of your inspectors so we can vet them for their insurance requirements?

The second item I asked for was the process followed; a step-by-step example. It would be helpful if you had a customer we could follow from start-to-finish. I’ve had a couple of NOAH certified clients contact me, so with your approval I’d like to contact them (they’ll remain anonymous) and see how the process went from start to finish along with when they were inspected, etc.

I am in conversations with many (probably) of the same large insurance companies and actually discussed your certification program (along with Pacific) last week with several senior executives. Everyone agrees that there should be a uniform standard but in the overall scheme our “fad/movement” is very small. There were 250,000 RVs sold in August alone and so the focus remains on that space instead of our much smaller (but vocal) group.

Many of these executives (C level) are congregating for their annual “council”meeting tomorrow at the Broadmoor in C/S and I am having several meetings with different carriers to discuss insurance – and our Tiny Home program is one subject.

I was hoping to be able to get a certification approved by this meeting (in a formal manner) but since we seem to only be at square one – the “show me the information” stage – I guess I will defer approval process for 3-4 months and instead focus on rolling out our program to the 16,000 insurance agents (since our core business model is insurance wholesaler) we transact business with on a monthly basis. Fighting/arguing with you to get information to expand our insurance appetite is too time consuming and truly not a good use of my time.

I’ll circle back around with the Tiny Home Association and discuss certification options with them in the near future. Hopefully you will have made progress there. I’ll also finish up our process with Pacific and get their program approved. At least we will have a West Coast Option.

Just wanted to do a quick follow up.. We have been focused on NOAH and their process but I wanted to bring attention to: http://www.pacificwesttinyhomes.com a division of Pacific West Associates. I have spoken to Chuck and his team and they are all engineers/inspectors etc… See their web site for what they have!

I have found the conversation here very interesting and informative. I appreciate the information from Martin Burlingame as regards Pacific West Associates, inc., and concur with what has been stated by Andrew Odom, Gabriella Morrison and Martin Burlingame. I think NOAH has a way to go with their program, but kudos for working on the process and supporting tiny homes.

I was glad to see that there is an organization here on the West Coast , Wyoming, that has a valid game plan and organization in place with qualified and certified individuals. I will be contacting them since I am here on the West Coast. I have been swaying between the DIY route or having a park model manufacturer at least frame, wire and plumb a unit that would be insurable etc. where I could complete the interior but be road and park legal at least.

Beginning a new tiny house custom manufacturing company, and was confused about the RVIA vs NOAH relationship with regards to insurance and financing options for my future customers. Commenting here so I can follow along with this thread. I’ve learned A LOT here already, but my question, “should we build our principles to RVIA certification or NOAH guidelines” is still not answered.

Having been involved in a trade association for several years in a different industry, I know how thankless a job it is, and understand completely the, “you can’t get authority until you have membership clout, and you can’t get members without having authority” conundrum.

Can you gentlemen let me know if what I have so far is correct:
–tiny houses don’t fit into any genre of current insurance and financing without RVIA certification
–tiny houses typically don’t technically fit into the RVIA categories either
–neither RVIA certification nor NOAH seal of approval is a guarantee of insurability nor available financing

I could not have said it better myself. I respect what you are trying to do Andrew Bennett but please don’t confuse the ordinary builder/buyer. NOAH is merely a certification. It is not recognized by any authority other than itself. A certificate you print on Photoshop can do almost the same thing. It can make your tiny house available for complete permanent dwelling and travel insurance. The operative word being CAN. It’s like saying there is a 50% chance of rain. It either can or cannot rain. It either will or will not. It is up to the insurance company/underwriter.

RVIA are also a form of certification. The difference is that they are the governing body recognized for RV standards. They have a 44-year old reputation and works with national regulatory bodies including the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the Federal Highway Administration and the United States Park Service regarding regulations affecting the RV industry. They have become the industry standard and therefore the most respected body to lenders and insurers. They regulate code for well over 300 industry participants (manufacturers, advocacy groups, mechanics, etc)

So if you are looking for insurance then a NoAH certificate should not be the reason. If you are looking for a third party evaluation of your self built then NOaH or their competitors would make sense (I would recommend researching price , inspection methodology, etc)

Again getting a sticker certificate should not be based on a need for insurance. Building to a national code makes the most sense so RVIA is a best idea.

Amanda, Andrew Odom is mistaken. NOAH cerinfication can make your Tiny House available for complete permanent dwelling and travel insurance. RVIA states specifically in their bylaws that their certification CAN NOT be used on a tiny house, home, or dwelling.

My wife and I bought a Tiny Home (no wheels) built by a well known builder. The TH is to be delivered and set up on our land in a couple of days. Called to get homeowners insurance and was told the TH has to be either NOAH or RVIA certified. Dohhhh!!!!